Madeline Alice

Six Years

It has been six years since the war in Iraq started.

Six Years.

Perhaps I am going against the grain. I know that the five year anniversary usually warrants more attention than either the fourth or sixth, but I need to take a moment to reflect. While I am sure others will say this and have said this - whatever this is -more eloquently, here is inarticulate and very primitive thoughts on the past six years.

A quick google search yields that in that time:

4259 US soldiers have been killed

318 Coalition Troops have been killed

139 Journalist have been killed

1264 Contractors have been killed

and an estimated

1,320,110 Iraqis have been killed


These are just numbers

Incomprehensible numbers

With each one being a father or mother or daughter or son or sister or brother or friend

A person

Each one leaving a father or mother or daughter or son or sister or brother or friend


So the numbers grow


And then there are those who are wounded

And those who witness


The numbers grow


When I was thinking about what I would write, I was thinking vaguely of going off on where I was six years and where I think I will be in six years.

And then as I started to write and I saw my problem

This isn't about me


Remembering that the numbers are a representative

And an obscure one at that

Of all that has been lost

And that we can still dream and hope

For peace

And for the numbers to stop growing

Bananas

You can't help but laugh at this - I could watch it for hours.

The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10c

Prince Charles Scandal

Daily Show Full Episodes
Important Things With Demetri Martin

Political Humor
Economic Crisis

Three Hankie Movie

Going back from an episode of my youth of when "the horsey died" during a tv show, I am a known crier during movies. However I never cried through a whole movie or even enough to warrant three hankies.

That was until I saw Taking Chance.

From the opening credits of darkness with his death to the end credits when we finally see Chance from home footage of him as a child, I was a blubbering mess. I had a tissue at hand - or more acurately at nose and eyes - for all 80 minutes.

A long 80 minutes and yet so heartbreakingly short.

For like in the movie where his escort felt like he was still alive while he is still on his final trip home, somehow he still lived during the movie.

Until he is finally home for the last time. And with a last salute is gone.

Just writing this has made me a sobbing mess once more - another tissues is needed.

Maybe two.

For I miss Chance - a person I never knew and will never know - too.

It’s All Relative

Today it was 44 degrees. Back home in California I would have bundled up as this would be a cold day. However here in Boston coming off of a rather cold streak, it felt warm. In fact I was tempted to go out in flip flops.

On another front, I wish that everyone has good health. Or at least I thought so until today.

tomorrow class canceled?: POLU580.57198.sp09
To all:

I am coming down with a nasty flu. I am canceling the class for tomorrow, but please check out your emails tomorrow morning for additional notice. If I feel better, we will hold the class as scheduled and I will send a new message to announce that.

--L.Topaloff


Yet now I won’t deny that a part of me really hopes that my professor is a feverish phlegmy mess tomorrow. A startling large part.

Hallmark has got my mark

Is there anything more moving then a Hallmark Hall of Fame movie?

Is there anything more moving then a Hallmark commercial.

Sheesh – they get me everytime!

Ms. Roller Goes to Washington

More to come when I get back!

A Reflected Year : 2008

I found this on another blog and while some of the questions are hokey, overall I think it is a nice way to reflect back on a year.

1. What did you do in 2008 that you’d never done before?

The candidate I voted for President won! I worked a semi-retail job.

2. Did you keep your new year’s resolutions, and will you make more for next year?

No – on that front I failed miserably. At least now I have 12 months to do better not that I have made any yet.

3. Did anyone close to you give birth?

One of my cousins gave birth at the beginning of the year and another one at the end.

4. Did anyone close to you die?

Two people. First my Grandfather in August. Then Micah in October.

5. What countries did you visit?

No traveling for me in 2008. I did make it to the Cabin. And back to Boston.

6. What would you like to have in 2009 that you lacked in 2008?

My drive.

7. What dates from 2008 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?

I am terrible with dates but there are several moments that will stay with me forever. The search for a rock in Disneyland with my brothers. Sitting on the deck of the Cabin watching the sunset. The cars pulling over out of respect at Micah’s funeral procession and then being saluted by the patrol officer. Curbside seats to the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade. Moving all my stuff in. Getting my mom to do the Bay2Breakers. Playing rockband at Pesach. Having all my Roller cousins together. Putting dirt on my Grandfather’s grave.

8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?

Getting back into school – now if I could only finish!

9. What was your biggest failure?

Quite a few actually – though the root of all comes from the fact that I seem unable to finish or truly start anything. Schoolwork for example…

10. Did you suffer illness or injury?

Knees and scissors where not my friends in 2008.

11. What was the best thing you bought?

Well by not going to school for most of the year, I “bought” time with my family. In doing so I discovered so many tales and pictures. All the photo stuff I bought for it enabled and started many great conversations.

Oh the Wii Fit which I got for the family. I have my dad doing exercise! My mom too but she already and was much easier to get to do it.

12. Whose behavior merited celebration?

Barack Obama? That seems like a cop-out though.

13. Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed?

Sarah Palin comes to mind. Mine would be a close second though.

14. Where did most of your money go?

Paying off debt.

15. What did you get really, really, really excited about?

The election.

16. What song will always remind you of 2008?

Breaking Love and Down to Earth from Wall-E

17. Compared to this time last year, are you:
a) happier or sadder? Happier
b) thinner or fatter? Thinner - barely
c) richer or poorer? Richer - technically

18. What do you wish you’d done more of?

I wish I had actually finished all that I started

19. What do you wish you’d done less of?

Doing nothing – time wasted

20. How did you spend Christmas?

At home with family. Dinner menu consisted of Chinese food, dinner rolls and pie!

21. Did you fall in love in 2008?

Perhaps started to

22. What was your favorite TV program?

I think I am going to go with Chuck. Pushing Daises, The Daily Show and Colbert Report also up there.

23. Do you hate anyone now that you didn’t hate this time last year?

No – peace love and mickey mouse people!

24. What was the best book you read?

I really enjoyed Inkheart.

25. What was your greatest musical discovery?

Ha! This question implies I have some music coolness which just isn’t the case

26. What did you want and get?

Back to Boston

27. What did you want and not get?

My old self back

28. What was your favorite film of this year?

Toss between The Dark Knight and Wall-E

29. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?

Nothing particularly special and it was my first year anniversary of turning 21.

30. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?

If I could have gotten my schoolwork in hand

31. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2008?

Jeans and t-shirts

32. What kept you sane?

Not sure I really did…

33. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?

Toss between Jon Stewart and Christian Bale

34. What political issue stirred you the most?

The election and proposition 8

35. Who did you miss?

My Grandfather and Micah

36. Who was the best new person you met?

What a question! I am going the easy route here and will say my new first cousins once removed Eliza, Carly and Clayton.

37. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2008.

Avoiding things only makes the problem harder to deal with when you have to and usually by then it is so much bigger than what you started with.

38. Quote a song lyric that sums up your year.

Did you think you’d escaped from routine
By changing the script and the scene?
Despite all you made of it
You’re always afraid
Of the change

Time Before Land

I can't turn it off. I can't seem to help but watch.

The Land Before Time II is on.

It is so bad it hurts.

With laughter or tears I am not sure.

Save the Mother's, Save the Childhoods

While this happened almost a month ago, I cannot begin to express my happiness that Mother's Cookies will live once more.

Oh thank you Kellogg's, thank you!

It was the power of words, it was the weakness of words

Dickens knew what he was talking about when he wrote “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to heaven, we were all going direct the other way …”

My heart is filled with such joy at the election of Barack Obama as President and so empty with the passing of proposition 8. I try to console myself with the victory and not look at what was lost.

I don’t know if I can find the correct words to describe what I am in feeling – certainly it won’t be eloquent. Emotions never are adequately expressed with words. For words never seem powerful enough – after all they are just a bunch of letters arranged and then rearranged. (On the matter of letters – can I just say I never noticed how often I use the letter u until the key got stck) Words are used so frequently and casually that meanings become lost.

Yet words have such power. Sticks and stones may indeed break bones but so can words. Words said at a curtain time, in a certain place can drastically change a life. The three letters of DNR on a medical chart. The word guilty to a person standing trial. The words I do to the person you love.

Then there are the words. Words used to express so much, things so big that they come to be meaningless shells. Freedom. Hope. Love.

For all that words are just a bunch of letters arranged and then rearranged I clearly remember how powerful I felt when I realized that I could spell hate, as it was simply hat with an e.

After this election – a lot of words churned around in my head as I tried to vocalize my heart. I couldn’t understand how someone could vote to deny someone else a right. How they could be so fearful of the new President elect? Oh the words – idiot, stupid, bigot – come so easily to mind to describe these people, it scared me.

For I think of my mirror. The person who’s heart is so empty with the election of Obama as President and filled with such joy at the passing of proposition 8. I imagine they console themselves with a victory in defeat. This person who can’t understand how a person could vote the way they did – believe what they believe. How can there be people who are so stupid, who are such idiots.

The paradox continues. People argue for tolerance of their views and values while showing intolerance for those who disagree. People demand their rights while attempting to take away someone else’s.

I wish I had the words to make sense of this, to find a bridge or at least help construct. I wish it could be done, that I had such power, simply by adding an e at the end.